DESIGNED FOR LIFE presents a series of extraordinary findings from nearly 50 years of research studying the nature and behavior of individuals when they were intensely pursuing an activity of unsurpassed personal value. Without exception, in tens of thousands of people studied one-at-a-time, author Arthur F. Miller and his research team found each person had been endowed with a unique pattern of motivated giftedness which appeared hardwired, and drove the person to achieve one certain consummation. Based on this rigorous and systematic phenomenological research, and using an idiographic paradigm, the author and colleagues were able to develop a science of persons which is predictive, comprehensive and explanatory -- a feat which psychology has been seeking since the late 19th century. Among other findings is the irrelevance of Darwinism to the nature and behavior of the person, probably because nobody ever took the time to study the individual! What is so remarkable is the emergence of designed giftedness in contrast to systems of education, work and religion that consider people as infinitely malleable and available to be shaped and reshaped by their teachers, their managers, and their clergy. As a result, the great majority of people are denied and impoverished by the very institutions established to enable their fulfilling and productive lives.
About the Author: Art Miller has spent most of his adult life seeking to better understand the person and how to integrate faith and life. He has found that there is one answer to both issues. He founded People Management in 1961, now SIMA International Inc, a network of consultants operating in four continents providing a range of human resource services based on his discoveries. He is best known for his research of the phenomenon of giftedness as innate in human nature. Art and his colleagues have studied the achievement history of an estimated 100,000 professional and management personnel; mainly one-at-a-time. Based on the rigorous phenomenological research, and the absolute consistency of their findings, he developed a System for Identifying Motivated Abilities [SIMA(R)] as the centerpiece of his lifework. Realizing the need for a paradigm shift to one stressing the individual, Art began making presentations, writing articles and books explaining a new virtual psychology based on their research findings. Previously unknown among academics, the massive amount of evidence they gathered about the nature and behavior of the individual explained the inability of psychology over a century of its life searching for governing principles, to generate a science of persons or even a useable definition of the person. Art has written/co-written books on inborn giftedness and articles for AMA's International Digest and International Forum, Institute of Personnel Management, American Society Of Training and Development, College Placement Council, and the Association for Manufacturing Excellence, Personnel Management. Art Miller introduced SIMA to NASA in1963 and continued to work with their headquarters, Goddard, Langley, and Ames Research Centers into the1970's. He introduced SIMA to Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, Dow, Monsanto, DuPont, IBM, Amoco, Upjohn, Merck, 3M, CIGNA, NY Life, Aetna, Prudential(UK) North American Philips, Ralston Purina, Phillip Morris, McDonnell Douglas, Lummus, Stone and Webster, Kodak, General Foods, American Gas Association, ALCOA, General Atomics, London Bus and a few others. Art helped lead the charge with American Society for Quality when, under the management of Disney, a national program was inaugurated promoting The Stuff Americans Are Made Of and needed a way to identify motivations of workers. He was instrumental in the faith renewal movement and introduced SIMA and Discover Your Design in church-based groups, colleges and institutions.